


A Heavy Silver Lining

by dream_machine



Category: Persona 3
Genre: Angst, Angsty Schmoop, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Mentions of Canonical Character Deaths, Survivor Guilt, existential crises at 2 am, getting over things but not really, is it time travel or just insanity?, kierkegaard would be fucking proud, people with shitty problems and dealing with them in shitty ways, say "angst" more than four times and it sounds like EDM, they're trying guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-11 21:36:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16860724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dream_machine/pseuds/dream_machine
Summary: Two teenagers tasked with the end of the world hash out some long-standing personal issues.Or:When faced with an increasingly uncertain future, sometimes the past is all there is to go back to.





	A Heavy Silver Lining

There was a fly on the window.

It had been buzzing there for the better part of the week, bouncing off the frost-stained glass with angry little chitters. But the barrier would remain unmoved, no matter how relentlessly it would fling its fragile chitin shell against it. Even on the near-impossible chance that it managed to escape, it would only be rewarded by the frigid blast of wintry death outside and collapse under the snow caking its wings.

When the buzzing grew especially furious during his study sessions, Minato would quietly slip on his Sony headphones and his latest indie album obsession would tune out the sound of struggling.

Perhaps he was cruel to delay the inevitable by passively allowing it to continue existing in its misery. And yet, it was hardly the fly’s fault for being blissfully unaware of what kind of fate awaited beyond the glass. It had a very short life, after all.

* * *

“Let’s all take time to think on this,” Mitsuru had said.

They’d certainly thought, and they’d each made their answers clear.

Junpei refused to talk to him – his door remained shut and every call went unanswered no matter how many excuses Minato came up with to come knocking. When her eyes weren’t downcast at her feet, Yukari was shooting him these pitiful looks like he was bound to drop dead at any moment. Fuuka was wringing her hands constantly; she didn’t approach to inquire about the next Tartarus trip or ask him to try her much-improved cooking again, or anything else for that matter. The only time he saw Ken or Koromaru was when they were running off to or coming back from somewhere, the boy’s once-warm brown eyes now terse and the dog nuzzling at his hand timidly for any stale trace of comfort. Even Aegis had been sent back for repairs, and no one, not even Mitsuru, knew when she’d return.

Not that it should bother him. They were free to do what they wanted, and if they wanted to avoid him, that was fine. It left Minato free to do what he wanted, as well.

It was the thirteenth of December, and in about three weeks SEES would have a crucial decision to make. Until then, they would carry on as they usually did, plunging into whatever else consumed their lives as a distraction before they could be dragged back into the mess that was the oncoming apocalypse. Junpei shut himself in his room to play video games. Yukari and Fuuka hung out with friends, avoiding the gloomy air that haunted the dorm for as long as they could. Akihiko spent hours in the ring, arriving home after dark with his shirt collar soaked in sweat. Mitsuru was working harder than ever to keep the student council in order while staying on-point with her college preparations, frequently seen rushing to and fro around the school. Ken stayed at the shrine, watching Koromaru run laps around the playground; the dog was probably the only one to remain truly carefree throughout this. And Minato did what he did best: honed the powers of his Personas and, if Igor’s blathering had any grain of truth to it, dreaded what was apparently the upcoming end of his journey, like the sudden crash against rock-bottom after a very long fall.

* * *

His music player would remain functional for at least forty-eight more minutes, but he needed more than boppy tunes to distract him tonight. Pawlonia Mall had closed a short while ago, sealing him off from the Velvet Room and the elevator’s soothing hum, and he was hardly in the mood for socialising.

Minato’s eyes fluttered briefly; he snapped them open just as quickly before he could drift off and let this chance slip out his fingers. The dorm had long since grown quiet, but that was never a certain sign that the hallways and common spaces were completely vacant; having been quiet enough to take plenty of Shadows (and a few people) by surprise, he knew just how easy it was for even the most wary to get caught off guard.

He cracked his door open and scanned the second-floor corridor for signs of life – none, seeing as it was past eleven on a school night – before swiftly and silently crossing towards the stairs, as if he was already plunged into the belly of Tartarus’ tower and if he didn't remain vigilant the haunted faces of his dormmates might swill from the corners like the Shadows’ murky, monstrous forms. Without the usual daytime ambience of Iwatodai Dorm’s lively occupants to drown it out, every crunch of carpet under his shoes was deafening.

Pausing on the steps, Minato craned his neck to catch sight of anyone loitering on the couches. All clear. No one was stationed at the reception desk either, as normal, but it never hurt to check, even if the only time he’d seen the space in use was when he first encountered Pharos –

Ignoring the pang in his chest, he went straight for the door. There was no time. He had no time to think - 

“Where are you headed?”

Minato’s brain short-circuited in a hair-raising burst of panic. His skin went cold and clammy, even as anxious bursts of heat flooded his clothes. A numbness had spread up to his fingertips and his tongue was heavy in his mouth, but he had the capacity to silently curse himself for not checking the dining room before he boldly strode past it _but come on who goes for a snack at eleven at night!_

He turned slowly, a few degrees at a time, until he was facing _no no no no_ Akihiko _why_ _now_. The senior was slouched against the doorway with one hand hanging from his pocket, the other holding a protein shake, and an eyebrow cocked apprehensively. Judging from the half-rumpled uniform and the stack of textbooks on the counter, he must’ve been staying up to study.

Akihiko’s keen silver eyes traced the holster at Minato’s hip, the hilt of an Evoker glinting by the hem of his jacket. Then the stacks of weapons and the small knapsack of rations slung over his shoulder. They narrowed in suspicion.

Minato swallowed, hoping it wasn’t as audible as it felt.

“Kind of late to be going outside. Isn’t it getting close to the Dark Hour?”

“I…”

He could lie. He was well practiced; the multitude of powerful Personas humming in the corners of his mind was proof enough. But in face of the glaring evidence he was stupidly toting around in the open, Minato would have to pull out some very elaborate BS to convince anyone of anything.

“Well?”

He scrambled for any options that wouldn’t involve confessing, and briefly considered knocking Akihiko out cold. Attacking a teammate wasn’t something he’d ever done willingly, though, not to mention the risk of injury and putting yet another SEES member out of commission. They had already lost too many allies –

_Fuck fuckfuckfuck stop it_

“Hey, you’re shaking.” Through the haze that had descended across his vision, Minato saw a red-and-white blur drawing nearer. “You alright? What’s going on?”

A hand, cased in black, was reaching out to him, drifting closer and closer until he recoiled from the threat of touch –

He did the only thing he could, and ran.

A shout followed him out the door. It only spurred his feet into moving faster.

* * *

The cold air was harsh in his lungs, stabbing a thousand icy needles from inside his chest with every rattling breath until the taste of iron made it hurt less. The wind stung his face into numbness, freezing watery beads in the corners of his eyes and in a diamond-like speckle across his lashes. Around him the city turned into dark blurs of buildings whose brick backs shunned him, and streetlight-pale streaks sat stark against the dusty snow.

Rather than going to the station, his feet carried him across the Moonlight Bridge. Sodium light rippled against the murky waters far below and cold bit the tips of his ears. Occasionally a car would slog by to join in on the howling chorus of wind before fading into the distance.

Minato stopped for a moment to gaze at a sedan that rushed past and watched as it crossed the bridge smoothly and disappeared into the safety of the other side, until the dark and clamour swarmed around him again and he _had to run_ –

Finally he found himself doubled over in front of the Gekkoukan school gates, transfixed by the green light that washed over the snowy fields as Tartarus rumbled into its full and terrible glory. It spawned in him the same sort of dread every time. At least in the comforts of daylight no one walked the streets with their bodies tensed and their eyes darting around for nightmares on the prowl. They didn’t know that they were supposed to.

For a moment, Minato let himself imagine all of this was a bad dream. The whole year, the friends who stumbled across his way, this sense of strength and destiny that paved a future across what had once been a dry and barren wasteland of possibilities shrouded in noxious fog. It was all just a fabrication made by someone stuck in his head for too long.

Flinging his sword and the knapsack of healing items to the side, Minato stumbled ahead and pulled out his evoker. His hands were trembling.

* * *

“Persona!”

The brilliant light of Morning Star turned the dark sky white with a raw power that made the blood hammer in his ears, like some feral beast inside him had awoken from its slumber and was trying to claw out of its prison. He nearly keeled over from the amount of strength the attack sapped from him, but the lack of any visible dent in the stone-faced walls spurred him on. He fired another round.

“Surt!”

Flames licked the base of the tower, melting the snow that covered the ground around it into a moat of muddy sludge, but the heat singing his face was to no avail. He brought Orpheus Telos to the forefront of his mind, envisioning crooked fingers of lightning razing Tartarus’ pinnacle into crumbs with a mere flick.

_“Minato!”_

A voice bounced across the empty courtyard amidst the sizzle of electricity, accompanied by urgent footfalls that grew louder, drew closer. Gloved hands clamped down on Minato’s arm before he could bring the evoker to his head again. “You’re going to kill yourself if you keep using up your energy like that!”

He almost shouted that he didn’t care. What did a few days early matter?

After a frantic struggle that was definitely going to leave a few bruises come morning, Akihiko finally wrestled the evoker away from him. As soon as he did, Minato pelted towards Tartarus like the Reaper was after him and rammed his shoulder against the wall, only to be bounced back and sent sprawling across the half-thawed snow. Undeterred, he charged again, using his frail body as a battering ram in the vain hope that it could be the stone to topple Goliath, but it seemed no holy power was on Minato’s side to help him dislodge so much as a single brick.

Akihiko merely stood by for a bewildered moment to watch him crash into the walls and skitter across the ground helplessly, again and again. “What the hell are you doing?”

What did it look like he was doing? Tartarus was the highlight of the Dark Hour, the remnants of the Kirijo Group’s sins, a manifestation of humanity’s rallying cry of despair – literally the source and symbol of their miseries. This thing was why he was trapped. This thing had killed Shinjiro, and Mitsuru’s father, and had to be torn down because none of them would have a moment of rest with it around. As long as it was still here they would have slate-eyed monsters waving flyers for the end of the world. There would be Shadows slurping thoughts like stew, sucking them dry of all feeling until they were cold, empty pieces of porcelain, ready to crack under the lightest tap. There would be no more warmth or smiles, only waiting for the spring when worms would poke their heads from the half-thawed dirt and take them under ground where the earth could swallow them up and his head felt like it was splitting in half from the pressure, _too much -_

“Stop it. Minato, just stop for one damn second – hey –!” A strong pair of arms fastened around him and, lost in a rage that only swelled at the act of someone trying to control what he couldn’t himself restrain, Minato fought back, ignored how Akihiko’s voice shook every time he hit the wall, ignored the cold scrapes stinging his skin. He ignored it. He ignored it all.

All the while, the tower loomed above them tauntingly, unscathed as ever.

Minato lunged again with a guttural scream as if the wayward moon's eerie light was mutating him into some rabid and unholy creature, but Akihiko clung on like a straitjacket, holding him tighter and tighter the more he struggled.

He hated Akihiko for being too weak to stop all this. He hated himself more for being strong enough to stop it. But most of all, he hated this damn tower, all two-hundred-and-sixty-four floors of it, and everything else involved in its creation. He hated it, but it stood there all the same.

His energy was nearly spent trying to shake off Akihiko alone, and even moons of training hadn’t prepared him for such a gruelling and pathetic struggle, which consisted more of taking turns dragging one another across the frosted grass like petulant children than any actual fighting. In a final and desperate attempt to break free, Minato threw all his weight forward; this succeeded in throwing Akihiko off balance, but it didn’t break the grip he had on Minato’s jacket, resulting in them both plummeting to the ground ungracefully.

Minato felt the air get knocked from him in a _whuf_ as one-hundred-and-sixty pounds of boxing champion landed square between his shoulderblades. Akihiko scrambled off him in a panic while he lay in a daze, until the senior had the foresight to pin his arms down in case he tried to struggle further - which he did, scuffling and cursing and taking wild swings until he nearly forgot it was Tartarus that he was supposed to be thrashing, not his teammate. By then he was eating dirt, sandwiched between the ground under him and Akihiko’s bulk on top, his body too exhausted to obey the creature curled up in his chest and snarling at him to fight back _you coward._

“Easy,” he heard Akihiko wheeze, the senior sounding as worn out as he felt. “Just focus on breathing.”

No, he didn't want to focus on anything but tearing down this abomination until his fingers bled. But Minato could hear someone sobbing and wished _would they stop already_ , even as the sound seemed to emanate from his own chest.

“It’s not your fault, Minato. It’s not your fault. You’re not alone in this, okay? You’re not alone.”

From the way that Akihiko’s voice trembled, Minato had to wonder if he wasn’t the only one who’d needed to hear those words.

* * *

A short while later they were ambling down the Moonlight Bridge. Minato was wrapped in Akihiko’s red scarf and Akihiko was hauling what little gear they’d brought along. He probably would have carried Minato too, if the junior hadn’t brushed him off with what little pride he could salvage. It was already revolting enough that Akihiko had witnessed SEES’ normally calm and collected leader fall apart at the seams.

(It was even more revolting to think of what would have happened if he hadn’t.)

The walk home was silent except for two sets of footfalls crunching the thin layer of powder snow lining the streets; one was the intent and insistent tap of leather shoes; the other was heavy, listless clomping from a pair of boots. The light bathing the city went from green to a silvery white while the jumbled tower spiralling into the horizon vanished without a trace.

Aside from that, Minato barely registered any of the sights or sounds around him, instead using the steady hand that rested on his back as a guide. Fingers were digging into his coat like he might suddenly run off and leap into the chilling waters below.

(Takaya and Jin survived it. Who’s to say he couldn't?)

Before he knew it, he was seated at the dorm common area's dining table, Akihiko reduced to flashes of red and white that disappeared on a whim and reappeared with various items that he could barely process – a first aid kit, an opaque bottle of disinfectant, a pack of cotton pads that Minato squeezed like a stuffed animal – until he was snapped from his reverie by the cool sting of hydrogen peroxide and realized that, yes, his senior was in fact cleaning his wounds, brows scrunched together and the bandage on his temple wrinkled from the worry lines furrowing his face. The past few hours – the past few days – hadn’t been some awful hallucination he could forget tomorrow, or ever. Forget, he yearned to forget.

_“But if you kill me“–_

Akihiko’s hand faltered as a warm, watery trail ran over the scrape he’d been dabbing with a wad of antiseptic-soaked cotton.

“I killed them,” Minato choked out.

He was given a blank, clueless stare in return.

“They died because of me. They’ll keep on dying because I can’t do it.”

With a sigh that sounded closer to sadness and understanding than impatience or distress, Akihiko pulled out a fresh pad and wiped the corners of Minato’s eyes. Minato felt some mixture of guilt and rage inside him boil over. He snatched Akihiko’s wrist, forcing the senior’s rapt attention on him.

“I let Shinjiro die.”

_The first move is always the most uncertain in a match. But no matter how hard it is to do, keep your eyes on your opponent. Try to figure out their patterns, and plan ahead. Boxing isn't about just brute strength; you need some semblance of strategy, too._

“I knew what was going to happen to him, but I did nothing to stop it. I stood there and let him get shot, right in front of Ken. I watched the whole thing.”

Akihiko didn’t move.

_You don’t want to lash out wildly and you don’t want to flinch every time a punch comes your way. Whether you're blocking or attacking, it should feel like you’re the one in control._

“Mitsuru’s father, too.”

What would she do if she knew? Execute him? God knows that was far less than he deserved.

“I knew that Ikutsuki was going to betray us, what he was planning, and what it would cost us. And that’s not all."

He shifted forward in his chair, gripping Akihiko’s arm tighter as his vision swam.

_Hesitating is the worst thing you can do. There’s no time to second-guess yourself. Waver a little, and that half-assed move is going to be what ends you._

“I knew about the Fall, and about Nyx and Ryoji. I knew about Strega, Tartarus’ origins and every other danger that came our way, and I did nothing. I knew I could have done something but I didn’t.”

Akihiko stared at him for a few solid heartbeats, during which it felt like every muscle in his body was going to seize up and his blood vessels would burst from the pressure. The boxer wrenched his hand from Minato’s grasp and resumed dabbing at his wounds with greater intensity.

It stung worse than any barrage of insults or well-earned smack to the face.

Minato felt the last thread clinging to his patience snap.

“Were you even listening to a thing I said?”

He still said nothing. Didn’t even blink.

Minato clenched his jaw and forced himself to zone in on the wall past the senior's shoulder to quell the screaming, writhing creature inside him, but it rebuked taming no matter what efforts he made to muzzle it. He hadn’t cried in years, and each time he had was more unpleasant than the last – or maybe the events leading up to every meltdown were worse.

A part of him that he despised to the very core was going to completely break down then and there and allow Akihiko’s strong, diligent, gentle hands piece him back together, but he refused to show any more weakness than he already had. He was a man, and he had to responsibilities to live up to.

_(…But if he was Atlas and his obligations were the sky, the world would have been crushed ages ago, wouldn’t it?)_

“I was listening,” said Akihiko at last, his voice irritatingly calm. “I heard someone apologizing because he can’t forgive himself.”

“You don’t understand!”

Akihiko looked up sharply as disinfectant slopped across the tartan tablecloth, the bottle jostled by a fist pounding the dining table. “I was given a chance to fix this. I was supposed to stop it from happening – I’ve had so many chances to do that, I don’t know why I didn’t – “

A leather-clad palm covering his scratched hand silenced him. He looked up to see Akihiko’s flint-grey eyes, far too tranquil for it to be genuine, coaxing the screeching guilt that raked his insides and gripped him by the throat.

“I won’t pretend to understand what position you’re in or what you’ve been through, Leader,” Akihiko said quietly, “but I know for sure I’m as much to blame. I’ve been part of SEES for years and never once questioned any of its operations, all because I let the past blind me to everything but my hunger for power. If you’re going to tell me this is your fault, then I'm at least twice as guilty as you are.”

Minato wanted to yell at him, but somewhere between his brain and his mouth the words unravelled and emerged as semi-coherent whimpers instead that made him want to curl up in shame.

Akihiko soon finished with cleaning the grit from his face, and was meticulously wrapping him in medical tape and swathes of gauze like Minato was about to be mummified and shut into a dank tomb for several millennia. He seemed so engrossed in his task that Minato was surprised when he suddenly spoke again. “I had a sister, you know.”

_Had._ Minato said nothing, feeling bile rise in the back of his throat.

Shutters closed over his vision. A crinkled film reel playing through his head, filling his head with orange lamps and stripes of shadow like a tiger's pelt stretched across the pavement. He closed his eyes, but the sight was burned into his retinas, a white-hot spotlight on a stage he couldn’t reach, a whirl of flickering figures that played out events he couldn’t touch.

“I was kind of a mean older brother. I treated Miki like she was annoying, but I was always trying to control her. I just didn’t want her to get hurt, but since I was a brash kid, it came off bossy or dismissive. Miki would get mad, and when she was really annoyed, she’d shut herself in her room.

“We didn’t have locks on the bedroom doors, but we had these heavy, old dressers. Solid wood. What Miki would do is pull out the drawers one by one, and then she’d drag the whole thing in front of the door and put the drawers back, so I couldn’t get in. She’d come out when she had enough time to cool her head off and forget it, or when I finally saw sense and apologized.”

_Weary silence, wind through a window, tires crunching on dry pavement –_

Minato hissed as the fingers rolling up his sleeve tensed over a particularly sensitive abrasion. Akihiko drew back with a cringe. “Sorry.”

“It’s nothing.” Minato almost cringed himself at hearing the dry, raspy and unfamiliar shreds that remained of his voice.

He hoped, somewhat uselessly, that the interruption would end the story there. But as always it was too late.

“I heard them say later that the fire took place right under the rooms. I can’t even remember what I did to piss her off that time. It doesn’t really matter. They weren’t able to reach her before the boards collapsed. I didn’t even get to see the body; they used dentals to ID her. The only thing they could give me was that – that she might have fallen unconscious from smoke inhalation first.”

No. Nonono. _Burning rubber. Flesh. Mingling. Soaking the air. There's fire. More damage means less pain. Everything reeks –_

Akihiko’s fingers trembled as they struggled to wrap a band-aid around the knuckle of Minato’s right index finger. “Not a day goes by without me wondering why I wasn’t in her place.”

“Don’t –“ Minato squeezed his eyes shut as the queasiness he’d been resisting for some time now steamrolled him flat, turning his legs to jelly, crushing his chest past the point where breathing was impossible and squeezing out the thoughts into sticky paste that wouldn't wash off _wishing he asked them to stop, or slow down, just enough for things to go somewhere other than wrong, wishing he’d also faded into smoke and floated to their place in heaven but mostly wishing he’d stop wishing_ “Please don’t.”

“Well, what should I do?” Akihiko’s wry expression was the unabashed not-quite-a-grimace-not-quite-a-smile worn by anyone who’s come to terms with the fact that it’s better to wallow in hopelessness than perish to the despair that comes from struggling against it. “Forget her and move on, or honour her memory in guilt. Be a damned coward or a selfish bastard. What would you do?”

Minato refused to answer. He wouldn’t. Answering would mean acknowledging. He was going to breathe until the acrid recollections were expelled from his system, and everything would return to blissful normalcy. Akihiko would be his usual cocky, resolute self, never weighed down by crusty pessimism or self-loathing. He'd be the image of unflinching power and bravery that had left Minato paralyzed in awe when Cesar was evoked for the first time: steely-eyed, arcs of lightning shredding the battlefield, red cloak and silver hair fluttering in the wake of his tremendous strength. And Minato would be apathetic as ever, the go-with-the-flow guy for whom nothing, not even the end of the world, was worth losing his cool over; he would contentedly tune out the siren-song voice of every person who asked him for a listening ear, remain unaffected by the problems and pains they poured out to him; and SEES would be nothing more than a businesslike group of peers whose connection never went beyond cordial gestures and curt briefings or other professional obligations.

Not even Akihiko’s hand on his shoulder, an anchor to consciousness, would change that.

It wouldn’t.

It wouldn’t!

It didn’t matter how solid and durable it felt. Eventually the leather would wear away, and the exposed flesh would peel, and then the bone slowly dissolve into an indistinguishable dust gathered in a corner somewhere.

Though he didn’t recall closing his eyes, Minato risked opening them a sliver to shoot Akihiko a look that snarled _I hate_ _you_ while Akihiko returned it with a wry smile that said _probably not as much as I do_.

The burning smell grew stronger.

Minato didn’t stop exhaling until he nearly choked.

Nothing that happened in the past year or ten mattered. When graduation day arrived in a few months, he wouldn't miss any of the people that were leaving. The only thing he liked about the Dark Hour was having an excuse to use his Personas. He never thought about Ryoji or the things they'd shared, or what it meant for any of them because words were only aimless vibrations in the air accompanied by sour breath and flecks of spit. His breath wasn’t snagging every time he felt the tender brush of leather against his hands and when he lowered his head as far as it would sink into his chest and spat out “I hope you fucking die” every venomous word was meant for Akihiko, who wasn’t smiling sadly like he knew every thought running through his head because he'd been there before.

Finally, the senior leaned back to inspect his handiwork. Now that the adrenaline had finally died down, Minato felt like every muscle in his body was painfully swollen, every scratch and bump throbbing in a plea for attention. He studied the plaid tablecloth below for a diversion, his fingers picking idly at a loose thread that bulged in the evergreen fabric.

But like little hooks snagging his skin, the memories kept tugging his attention towards vague pieces of the past that had leached into this dorm building like a pesky mould, and he couldn’t help regarding each one wistfully even if the people occupying them were gone or now shut him out completely.

Was it the same for Akihiko, he wondered? Did he also feel a tug on strings in his chest when he saw the three-month-old cooking magazine abandoned on the coffee table? Did he ever linger in the fourth-floor command room and wonder what else he could have done if _only_ he could have done more? Did he ever feel the need to stop in his tracks when someone made a bad pun, or keep inhaling to capture the tranquil cloud hovering above them when they settled down at Port Island Station and waited for the trains to waken from the Dark Hour’s slumber? Or was Minato simply foolish for allowing this odd and painful nostalgia to be woven into him, until he couldn't separate it without tearing himself apart?

“Akihiko.”

“Mm?”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d tell you to forgive yourself.”

The only response to his statement was a dry laugh from the senior student, followed by the kitchen clock mercilessly ticking away and filling in what would have otherwise been a stable quiet. Instead, every click of the hands felt like another whip on the flank of a dead horse.

Time was still moving on and here they were, the impromptu grieving party for the losing side of the war, lingering around the camp to lick their old wounds while they patched up the fresh ones, nothing to return with or return to. They sat there like two glum castaways stranded in the middle of the lonely ocean, the air around them growing heavy with a melancholy thick enough to clog their chests.

It was Akihiko’s voice that waded through the uneasy silence first, scooting from his chair. “How about I make some tea?”

Minato searched his mental reserves for some joke to break the tension, but his mind just wasn’t up to the task and it would probably come off as morbid anyway. He settled for a dismissive shrug. He felt worn and emptied, like he’d just washed out his insides with a can of drain cleaner. Crawling down his throat, hissing in the pits of his stomach.

Akihiko made quite a show of searching for tea bags and grabbing a pair of mugs from the cupboard. Once there was nothing left to do but wait for the water to boil, his anxious paces punctured the shrill and continuous shriek of the kettle.

He returned soon enough with a steaming mug in each gloved hand. His eyes were purposefully fixed on the tablecloth. “Sorry for the wait.”

Minato shook his head, ignoring how the liquid trembled and slopped over the sides of the cup as Akihiko set it down in front of him. He wrapped his hands around the scalding hot ceramic, relishing in the pain that seared palms through the layer of bandages. It felt like agony, but it was probably nothing compared to being trapped in a burning ember as it ate him alive.

“How do you deal with it?” he asked, hoarse and hollow.

Akihiko glanced up in surprise, his tea bag still steeping though the liquid had long since become saturated in colour. His shoulders slumped; his face sagged with exhaustion. He seemed to age a decade before Minato’s eyes.

“I don’t.”


End file.
